Tomlin,1 in 1916, and many other physicians since then have advanced the opinion that diphtheria develops much less frequently in children whose tonsils and adenoids have been removed. Collins2 and Syndenstricker made a statistical study on school children and found that the incidence of diphtheria in children whose tonsils had been removed was 1.4 per thousand as compared with 4.6 per thousand in children with the tonsils present. The lessened susceptibility to clinical diphtheria of children on whom tonsillectomy has been performed has been attributed either to the removal of tissues which are especially subject to infection or to the fact that these children come in contact with diphtheria bacilli and that a clinically unrecognizable infection develops during the ten to twelve days that the mucous membrane of their throats is in the process of healing. It is believed that sufficient toxin is developed and absorbed to stimulate